


Keep Walking

by eveshka



Series: Tales of the Dawn King [21]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Angst, Gen, Spoilers, you know the damn drill
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-21
Updated: 2017-05-21
Packaged: 2018-11-03 11:06:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10965951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eveshka/pseuds/eveshka
Summary: When you're halfway through Hell, keep walking until you get yourself out.





	Keep Walking

**Author's Note:**

> Rating: T  
> Warnings: None  
> Characters: Aranea Highwind, Gladiolus Amicitia  
> Time Period: After the Dawn  
> Location: Lestallum

Prompto. Bright and sweet and energetic and strangely fierce while being unnerved and uncertain of everything, _Prompto_. Her light in the Six-forsaken darkness, the only source of anything resembling normalcy through pain and hardship... gone. That beautifully brilliant shade of blue, forever lost. All she could see when she closed her eyes now was red.

The red of his blood on her hands, on Gladiolus, on the desert sands outside of Keycatrich. Only it wasn't Keycatrich anymore. They'd renamed it after his death. Argentum Hollow. _Hollow_ was appropriate, she thought. _She_ felt hollow, had felt nothing but hollow since she’d heard that call on the radio, heard the death rattle in his voice when he’d… She forced her mind still and looked in the mirror.

_(Blood!)_ There was no blood on her anymore, _(So much blood- he was so pale!)_ though she still saw it ghosted over her arms. The soldier within her retreated at the pain felt by the woman, and all she wanted to do was wrap her arms around herself and weep. She wanted to sink into the carpet and lose herself in the pain, never rise, never set foot outside this house in Lestallum that held so many memories.

 

_Ignis and Prompto both laughing downstairs while she freshened up after leaving them with a newly opened bottle of wine. A low rumble of masculine voices that was suddenly punctuated by Prompto’s brightly golden laugh and she’d known in that instant that she loved him._

 

It was silent down there now. Gladiolus was there, waiting for her to come down the stairs so they could go to Prompto’s glass-raising. It had only been three weeks, it was a horrible tradition, she didn’t want to go and all she wanted to do was cry.

Her lipstick was the same color as his blood. It caught her, jarring her into a panic, and with a whimper, Aranea Highwind grabbed a washcloth and swiped at her lips, tears spilling down her cheeks and she clung to the counter with her free hand, scrubbing her lips raw with the other.

“Hey, hey… come on, you’re going to hurt yourself,” Gladiolus’ voice came from behind as he wrapped large tattooed arms around her. His right hand rested on her left shoulder, his left gently moving her hand away from her face and pressing it lightly to the counter. His amber eyes met her steel grey in the mirror, and he didn’t try to be macho and hide his sorrow. “It hurts, it fucking hurts. And I don’t have flowery words to give you, so I’ll just say it. You need to cry, do it. You want to hit something, hit me. But don’t hurt yourself.”

She broke, then, dropping her head and would have crumpled into the counter if not for Gladiolus’ strength. He held her up, turned her gently as she wept, and hugged her as if she was his baby sister crying over a lost cat.

 

It took twenty minutes for her to compose herself enough to lift her head from his shoulder and thank him quietly. He had her mascara on his shirt. She moved away from him and brought her hands up to wipe at her eyes, struggling to find it in herself to give him a weak smile in thanks. It was there, though, and she gave it as best she could.

He rested his hand on her shoulder for a moment, wiped his own tears away, and nodded. “I’m going to step out there, let you get ready. You need me, I’m just on the other side of the room.” His voice was gruff, thick with emotion, and he cleared his throat as he stepped out of the bathroom to go pull himself together in turn.

She stood in the bathroom, looking into the mirror, her makeup a mess and her eyes red. “Screw it,” she muttered, grabbed the washcloth, and scrubbed the makeup off. Prompto had always said he liked it better when he could see her freckles. He’d had more, and in places she loved to tease about. She was crying again. Those freckles were gone.

“Damn it,” she clung to the counter, trying not to crumple under the weight of her memories, and once again she felt strong arms lifting her. “Does it get better?” She asked quietly. “Tell me it gets better. It must. _Everything_ leads back to him.” Even Gladiolus, to an extent.

The sigh was heavy, pained, and when Gladiolus spoke, she could hear the sorrow in his voice. “I don’t know. Never…” he paused, then tried again. “I never fell in love. Not like what you two had.”

She rallied herself with a mighty sniffle. “He's everywhere, everything. Just now, it was my _freckles_. In a few minutes, it will be something else. And something after that. And after that. I can't do this. I can't see things without him here.” Her voice was rising, a strange panic gripping her, the panic of trying to live without _him_.

“You can, I know it.” Gladiolus rumbled behind her. “You're the strongest woman I've met outside of the Citadel. You stood against the Niflheim Empire and made it clear you weren't to be screwed with. You've held your own against any number of monstrosities. You can do this.”

_Because the alternative…_ she thought, _was joining him._ And that was something that went against everything she'd ever been: a promise-breaker.

 

_“Hey, ‘Nea?” His voice was as soft as his fingers threading throughout hair as he lay entwined against her. Soft lips trailed along her ear, his breath warm on her cheek. “Need a promise.”_

_This was it, he was going to go back on his word and make her promise to marry him, even after agreeing that neither of them were marriage material, and that the world wasn't designed for marriages anymore. She took a deep breath, closed her eyes, accepted her fate, and replied. “What am I promising, Prompt?”_

_It took him a long moment to get his words, and when he did, it was with his forehead pressed to hers. “This life, it's not like it used to be. Sure, they're rebuilding Insomnia and people are getting back to something like the old days, but you and me? We aren't like that anymore. What we lived through… it changed us.”_

_Well, this had to be the strangest damn marriage proposal Aranea had ever heard, but she was going to let him wander through it anyway._

_Prompto’s hand stilled, fingers in her hair and thumb gentle against her cheek. “So promise me, ‘Nea.” He whispered the words against her lips. “Promise me that if I die first, you won't follow me. Don't forget to love yourself enough to keep going. That halfway to Hell thing, yeah?”_

_Through, her brain supplied, as she lay there, sharing breath and love and, just for a moment, pain. Sure, she was older, but he was right. Nothing promised she’d die first. “I promise I’ll keep walking.”_

 

“When you're halfway through Hell, keep walking until you get yourself out,” Aranea whispered softly, closing her eyes and sighing. “He made me promise, the bastard. Made me swear that if he died first, I wouldn't follow him. Like he knew.”

“Then let’s get walking,” Gladiolus said, giving her a gentle squeeze before his hands left her shoulders.

She drew herself up, fixed herself with a look in the mirror, and nodded. “Right. Keep walking. For Prompto.” She'd do this. She'd promised. Thank the Six that she'd never promised not to cry.


End file.
